how to kill a living thing/ eibhlín nic eochaidh

Neglect it
Criticise it to its face
Say how it kills the light
Traps all the rubbish
Bores you with its green

Continually
Harden your heart
Then
Cut it down close
To the root as possible

Forget it
For a week or a month
Return with an axe
Split it with one blow
Insert a stone

To keep the wound wide open.


: eibhlín nic eochaidh, ‘how to kill a living thing’/ staying alive. real poems for unreal times (edited by neil astley)